Fly Tying Tutorial: The HD Craw

The HD Craw is a crawfish pattern I have been tinkering with for a few months and feel I have it dialed in pretty well.  This fly gives the profile I wanted, the right sink rate, and is castable on lighter fly gear if you drop down in rod weight.  You don't need a 6wt to chuck this fly, I did great with it on a glass 3wt during testing.  There are two ways I have weighted this fly, 1) with a mini Sculpin Helmet and 2) with a Flymen Cray Tail, lead wire, and a tungsten bead.  The Sculpin Helmet is clearly the easiest and fastest from a tying perspective, but I like the realism from the Cray Tail.  Here is the Sculpin Helmet version:

And here is the Cray Tail version of the same fly pattern:

In both versions, I use Pro-Tec Powder Paint to add an extra dimension of detail to the Cray Tail/Helmet.  It's quick and easy, and helps make the fly pop.  The recipe for the Cray Tail version is as follows.

Hook - DaiRiki 700B size 6

Thread - 6/0 and 200den GSP (for the deer hair)

Weight - Small Cray Tail, .020 lead, 5/32" tungsten bead

Antennae - Rubber legs

Mouth/Spreader for Pincers - Deer body hair

Pincers - Micro rabbit strip with Arctic fox hot spot/tips

Body - Arizona Diamond Dub 

Shellback - Hot melt glue

And here is the video tutorial:

I fished the Sculpin Helmet version pretty hard last weekend and it did not disappoint.  I caught several smallmouth bass and a rock bass on this fly, including a personal best on the fly in this stretch of a small flow.